R. M. Brinkerhoff

(4 May 1880 - 17 February 1958, USA)

Robert Moore Brinkerhoff was born in Toledo, Ohio in 1880. He studied music at the Cincinnati Conservatory and attended the Arts Student league in New York City. After a stay in Paris he returned to Toledo where he contributed political cartoons to The Blade, The Cleveland Leader and The Cincinnati Post. In 1913 he moved to New York to work as an illustrator for the Evening World.

He created his first and only comic strip, 'Little Mary Mixup' in 1917. This comic about a mischievous little girl evolved as time went by: by wartime, Little Mary had grown up and even joined the fight against the Nazis. R. M. Brinkerhoff was an allround artist, a painter, illustrator and writer of several books. He had a passion for the sea, owning several yachts and even an island (Brinkerhoff Island in Maine). He died in Minneapolis in 1958. His son, Robert Brinkerhoff Jr., also drew a comic strip, called 'Hagen, Fagin and O'Toole'.